Senior Member

About two years ago I partnered up with Dirk Tolanaar to complete a project as a Bob Shores tribute. The project was derailed due to some bad castings. Now that the castings are better, things are back on track. I received a set of castings in the mail and am going to start up the project. The project is new to this forum so for the new guy's and the guy's who only frequent this forum I intend to get you caught up and then i will complete the build as life allows.

Senior Member

Go to any model engine show and you will find numerous examples of Bob Shores
designed engines. The first IC engine I built was the Peewee designed by Bob. It
is one of the nicest running engines and never fails to start. That is why when this
project came about I jumped at the chance to contribute.

I have been working on a bit of a special project. I have been doing the CAD
work to complete the last engine Bob Shores was working on before He passed
away. Most people believe that the V4 Peewee was the last project Bob had
worked on. It is however the last engine He built. Bob was actually working on
the big brother of the Peewee with a ¾ bore and stroke.

Here is the story that was related to me by Dirk Tolanaar. Dirk was given the
rights to the Peewee and the bigger Pacifier by the Shores family.

Dirk's wife's Mother lived in Gainesville Florida. They made a lot of trips by
car to visit her for Vacations, Holidays, and the usual family things.
Almost every time they went, they would continue on to his Mother and Fathers
grave site in Cocoa Florida. While there he would make it a point to visit Bob and
Margaret, (Peewee as Bob called her) every time they were down that way.
Bob and Dirk were friends for several years before he passed away. Dirk always
marveled at Bob's machine work and beautiful engines. He only had a small
Lathe, and a little horizontal Barker Mill, and also a Drill Press. That
was the extent of his machine tools. Everything else he did by hand.

Over several trips to Bob's, Bob said that he would like to build a small
V-4, something like the one that Jerry Howell made. Bob being the type to
never waste an extra part from an engine he had built previously, made the
plans for the V-4 with the Hercules in mind, 5/8" bore and stroke. He
made the match plates and had the castings poured in a foundry up in Tampa.
He built the engine during 2003, and Dirk first saw it during Thanksgiving that
year. It was almost finished, but not quite. Dirk told Bob that he would
really like to build one, and to please keep me in mind when he was ready to
release the "Kit".

Dirk returned to Dallas, and waited to hear from him. Around March of 2004, Dirk
got a phone call from Bob. He said that he had finished the V-4, but it was
not quite running at that time, just a few Pops, and still had some bugs to
work out. Then he told Dirk that he was sick, and had refused to go forward
with treatment because there was no guarantee from the doctors, as to what
his life style would be down the road. Needless to say, they talked for quite
a while. Then he said that being a how Dirk was the first to see the
unfinished V-4, and had shown quite a great interest in it, did he want to
continue his work, and make it available to the MICE community. Dirk said that
would be an honor to help keep his work alive. He promised that he would keep
Bob's name on everything to do with this engine. All he would do is market
it.

The name that Bob had decided at first for the little V-4 was Pacifier. They
talked about that, and then he said that the engine was a little hard to
build the parts for, and was really not a Pacifier in the work shop, and
felt that a slightly larger version would be somewhat easier. During this
phone call, Bob and Dirk decided to change the name from Pacifier to Peewee ,
in honor to his wife. The Pacifier name would go to the larger design,
the 3/4" Bore and Stroke. He told Dirk that he had started the match plates
for the Pacifier, but no castings were made. Then he said that being as how
he was a member of BAEM Club, that he had talked to Ken Hurst, and agreed to
send Ken the match plates for the Pacifier and Little Devil, to use as a
fund raiser for the club.

They concluded the conversation with an agreement, that the next time Dirk came
to Florida, He should pick up the Peewee tooling, Radiator Tooling, and a
something else that he wanted him to have. Well several weeks passed, and
on May 18, 2004, Dirk had a bad feeling come over him. The next day, he found
out that Bob had passed away. A few weeks later, Dirk and his Wife were heading
to Florida for there summer Vacation. They made the trip to see Peewee, and pick
up what Bob had set aside for him. Match Plates, some castings, the Press to
build the Radiator, and all the plan cad files that bob had for most all of
his engines. When he had loaded it all in the car, Peewee and Dirk were standing
in the kitchen area talking and reminiscing about Bob, when she
said that Bob had something else that he wanted him to have. She gave him the
one and only Little Devil engine that Bob had made. Wow, what a gift. He
truly believes that he is the only person to have a Bob Shores built engine
beside Bobs wife and children.

He returned to Dallas and set about bringing the Peewee to life. There was a
lot to do, as the plans for it were not really complete. Several months
passed, and the Plans were finally completed. During this process, he had
been in touch with Ken Hurst. Ken did get the Pacifier and Little Devil
match plates, but no plans for either engine. Dirk told Ken that he had Bob's
Little Devil engine, and most all of the plan sets on Floppies. All of the
files for the engines were done in " ProEngineer", and had to be converted
to Auto Cad and PDF's. Ken and Dirk made a deal that he would complete the Plan
Set for the Little Devil, and send them to Ken and he would get the Pacifier
Match Plates, to be able to complete the plans for that unfinished engine in
return. During this process, over several months, actually a couple of
years, he received the match plates, and sent the plans for the Little
Devil, only to find out that the Foundry where the castings were to be
poured had had a fire, and a lot of stuff was damaged or destroyed including
the Little Devil. Thank God, Ken had picked up the Pacifier Match Plates
and had them at his home before the fire.

Well more than a few years have passed, and now we are finally going to
complete the Pacifier. I am sure that Bob Shores would be happy that this
is close to a finish. Dirk has sent the match plate out and had the castings
made. On my computer desk sit a set consisting of the block, oil pan, and bell
housing that were poured from Bob's original match plate. I have been over the
last few months designing the engine in what I believe would be the way Bob
would have built it. I have finished a set of working drawings and now it's time
to build it. When the build is complete a final set of plans will be sent to dirk to
sell with the Pacifier castings. I will put the prototype Pacifier in my personal
collection as my reward for the design work.

Here is the beginning

Here is the end

All I have to do is fill in the middle. This is going to be another long one and good god I have to make another CRANKSHAFT!!!

Senior Member

Well this is going to be the last report until I see some castings. I have done all i'm going to do on it. After the castings show up there will be very little to do. I am going to figure out what to do about a fan. Other than that, I'm waiting.

Senior Member

Well I was curious to see if the castings were any good. I was seeing some pits in the surface of the pieces and that made me a little nervous. I setup the oil pan casting and made some surface cuts. They looked pretty good so I surfaced the top of the casting down to size. The pocket for the crankshaft clearance was completed and all the holes were drilled and tapped if needed. The holes to mount the pan to the block are counter bored so mounting hardware will be flush and hidden when displayed. The pan will need to be bolted to the block to proceed any further.

Just in case anybody was wondering, the pan was held in the vise with about a half inch of vise jaw showing on the right side. Center "Y" was found using an edge finder between the jaws. The casting was then re-positioned center of the vise. With the flashing filed off, center X was found by centering on the casting. Y needs to be kept tight but X is not too critical. Because the mounting flanges need to be .200 thick when finished, I setup the oil pan onto a pair of 1/2 inch lathe tool blanks between the bottom of the flanges and the vise jaws. Then just touched off the blank to set the Z axis at -.200. If further information is needed email me and i can send over some 8X10 color glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one is too me used as evidence against me. I'd post them here but my photo bucket is 97% full and I have a ways to go in the thread.

Senior Member

First thing I did was to clamp the block down to the table bottom side down and took a minimum cut across the top of the peaks of the head/valley surfaces. Then I was able to clamp the block down upside down and machine the bottom. Keeps the block flat and in alignment with the bottom. It will come in handy later.

The block was then clamped to the table and indicated down one side, front to back.

The block was surfaced down to a layout mark to the proper depth to get the crankshaft centered on the cylinders.
The holes were drilled and the holes to mount the center bearing cap were tapped.
The center cap was installed and the pockets were machined for crankshaft clearance. This also brings the bearing cap to thickness and alignment with the block.
The front and rear of the block were machined 3/8 down leaving .005 for future machining.

With the oil pan installed the assembly is ready to be machined front and rear.
The oil pan protrudes past the block enough that the edge finder can be used to pick up the surface and find the split in the to parts to locate the crankshaft height.
The rails on the oil pan can be used to find center to locate the crankshaft the other way.
The skim cuts are registered to the bottom so all I will need to do is indicate the angle plate i'm going to clamp it to and it will be vertical.
Indicating across the machined surface of the block will get me level and vertical the other way.
And finally, machining .005 past the machined surface of the block will get me to finished depth.
And just think I have to do all that twice!

Senior Member

Hi Steve,
Well you can bet I'll be following along on this one. Love those V motors.The castings really look good.
gbritnell

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Hello George!

Thanks again for the gift. It's beautiful.

The castings are MUCH better now. I found a couple very small inclusions in the oil pan but nothing alarming. I'm talking very small. The block so far has been extremely nice. I am very happy with the set so far.

Edi from brazil

Hello Steve!
I also will be following this post. Knowing your work, it will be a state of the art work.
A couple of years ego I purchesed the casting kit plus some components from Dirk. Unfortunatly I did not have time yet to start this wonderful project.
I still don`t know the quality of the castings, I hope it is good.

Senior Member

Then a 5/8 bar of drill rod was inserted unto the crank bore. That held the block at an elevation that kept the crank tunnel perfectly horizontal. The rear of the block was pressed hard into the fixed jaw and the vise was then snugged up. The edge finder was used to find the center of the 5/8 shaft in front and behind the block roughly 10 inches apart. There was only a .0015 difference so I called it good.

Using the edge finder the center of the cylinder bank was located. A scratch mark was made at center and then I got a better idea. Two more scratch marks were made .3125 off center each way.

The block was then tilted into alignment and checked with a make shift square. I did have to tilt the block off 45 degrees just a tad bit. That really does not concern me at all. If the block comes out to be 89 degrees instead of 90 degrees it wont be a big deal. That minor error will not affect the way the engine runs at all. It is more important to me to get the head centered on the cylinder bank surface and properly fit.

The tool height was set by touching off the top of the bar in the crankshaft bar.

Then the cylinder bank was machined to height leaving .005 for later machining.

The center of the bar was re-checked with the edge finder just to make sure and the front of the block was found.

The cylinder holes were pre-drilled

The cylinder bores were bored to finished size and counter-bored.

The key cutter was used to cut the water jackets down in the bores.

Bolt and water passage holes spotted and drilled.

Lifter bores spotted in with a 5/16 endmill.

Lifter bores spotted and drilled.

And finally the set screw hole was spotted and drilled.

I am hoping to do the other bank next weekend and be done with the block at that time.

Well-Known Member

Ex Bogstandard

"That really does not concern me at all. If the block comes out to be 89 degrees instead of 90 degrees it wont be a big deal. That minor error will not affect the way the engine runs at all. It is more important to me to get the head centered on the cylinder bank surface and properly fit."

It is great to see confidence like that in a casting build.
They really are sometimes almost impossible to end up with perfect dimensions, and your approach has to be taken at times. If building from barstock, decisions like that don't usually have to be taken as you usually have full control over it.

Wonderful stuff and keep up the good work. I'm sure Bob would have appreciated it.

Senior Member

It is great to see confidence like that in a casting build.
They really are sometimes almost impossible to end up with perfect dimensions, and your approach has to be taken at times.

John

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Thanks John! I think it's important to report the error and why I went the way I did to show that things like this are not the end of the world. I'm sure it happens all the time but is under reported. I wanted to show it because I'm sure folks are going to build this model and I dont want them to panic if they run into the same problem. If I had cut a few more thousands off the bottom surface things would have been fine. As the crank and cam bores are complete taking some off the bottom is not an option so an 89 degree block is the fix and will be undetectable in its appearance or performance.

Senior Member

This morning, following the same procedure that was used yesterday, the other bank was completed. I had to make the same adjustment on the cylinder bank to get centered so I'm probably back to 90 degrees between banks. This leads me to believe that the bottom of the block must have been a little crooked.

The block was laid flat and the distributor holes drilled. I used a 3/4 inch drill bit to pick up the camshaft bore. It's very important to be centered on the cam bore for gear mesh so the hole ended up off center of the boss.

Here's where I went wrong. When I first laid out the block I made 2, 45 degree lines from center of the banks. Where those 2 lines intersect I should have scribed a line straight up and down to be sure it ran from center of the block up to the center of the distributor boss. Had I done that, I could have shimmed one side of the block to tilt it up to get the bottom corrected. Then the horizontal line could have been scribed to show bottom of block and machining could begin. Live and learn.

Well-Known Member

What I see here is a large diesel engine design based on the need for liners and how the coolant passages are drilled. What are you going to use for fuel or will it be compressed air? I gather bottom end lubrication will be splash type which of course is small engine type lubrication.

Well-Known Member

What I see here is a large diesel engine design based on the need for liners and how the coolant passages are drilled. What are you going to use for fuel or will it be compressed air? I gather bottom end lubrication will be splash type which of course is small engine type lubrication.

Senior Member

Well I wasn't real happy with the machine work on the engine block. I got a hold of Dirk and had him send me another set. For the last week I have been machining another set of castings. This set came out deluxe except I goofed where the lifter bore gets spotted. The hole is perfect but the quill drifted when I was using an end mill to "clean up" the surface. When painted I don't think it will even be noticeable. I made a document to show how I went about it. It is intended to be a guide to keep anyone who builds the project out of trouble and get a good outcome. If you purchase the plans and castings the "guide" will come with if you choose to use it. I'll attach a copy but I still need to add to it to include the bell housing casting work.